My daughter is turning 10. So far in life she has always been open about everything in her life, and respected the boundaries we have put in her life... we want to keep it that way.

So Sam brings to my attention different things that are "in", in various areas of life. Sam often informs me of the cool sites on the Internet that her friends are involved with. She wants to be part of all of them but has no problem when told she can't. However as she gets older I realize that Fisher price, TVO kids, and others like this, she is soon outgrowing or outgrown...

So Sam is showing me "teen" sites, or "tween" sites... they scare me... however I realize that soon enough she will want to branch out... I would rather help her find safe ones and be a partner than have her explore on her own!

So here is one she is interested in... I am wondering if any of you out there have heard of it or know about it or have heard reviews on it.

Also I am wondering if any of you have some sites that you could recommend...

Thanks for listening to a mother who loves watching her daughter grow up, yet is scared to death of the possibilities of the Internet!

Hey Margie, I know exactly what you mean. Jake is 10 and some of the sites his friends are on - ouch, I don't know where the parents are.

We have a filter on our computers from www.safeeyes.com It will cost you $50 per year but it is well worth it. You can set it up on mutliple computers, with multiple accounts tailor made to each person in the house if you like.

I realize you aren't looking for a filter however, the filter will block sites that Jake's friends recommend (fact is he will go on without asking now & we aren't always there to monitor him). When he asks us about a blocked site we get the opportunity to go on the site for ourselves and if we feel its okay we can unblock specific sites and allow his account to open them.

Otherwise, I can't yet help you out on girlie sites! We will be asking you in four years.

I think a filter is a priority but along with that is internet safety. I think teaching our kids basic rules is more important than not allowing certain sites. They need to know not to give out any personal info.

Also, you could sit down with her and browse the sites she is interested in and check it out together and decide together if it is okay or not.

I know what you are feeling though, fisher price and TVO are quickly becoming too young for her.funbrain.com is good, but I'm not sure if that would be on the young side or not, can't remember.

I have seen ads for Habbo on my adult websites- so they are marketing to all ages. Not sure if this would be an age appropriate site. The ads seem to be promising that you can "make friends" *wink, wink*. Now, I haven't actually been to the site but the ads were distinctly adult.

My kids like games2girls.com which has a large variety of games, toontown.com which can be played for free (or for more features you can subscribe), and club penguin. These are the three sites my girls (ages 12 and 10) are on the most. We also play on pogo.com some.

I am very careful of any site that allows chat because that is one way girls can get into a situation without realizing it. Toontown allows chat but it is all premade sayins and club penguin is the same way.

Yeah...I think that habbo is not the best place to start off with in terms of creating profiles etc. It's not monitored for content and I just took a quick peek now. I didn't register with habbo and I could see profiles, if they were on-line or not and more than a couple "sexy" "single" and even a question directed to a 12 year old asking "r u easy?" I was on the site for about 3 minutes.

It is hard to find a balance...maybe start with some of the other recommendations that were given first?

http://www.christiantopsites.com/search/Teen_Sites/index.html I think you may find some stuff to help you out :) Some of these look great! Hopefully they're not too old yet... I'm sure you'll find a happy medium. Maybe you should suggest MSN so that way you can monitor who her friends are. You can also set her profile to private and limit what she can do. I know it's not safe if you don't want it to be but with guidance it can be.